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Everyone's Fine with Virginia Woolf

Everyone's Fine with Virginia Woolf

EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF

BY KATE SCELSA

DRAMATISTS SERVICE INC. EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF Copyright © 2019, Kate Scelsa All Rights Reserved EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF is fully protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America, and of all countries covered by the International Copyright Union (including the Dominion of Canada and the rest of the British Commonwealth), and of all countries covered by the Pan-American Copyright Convention, the Universal Copyright Convention, the Berne Convention, and of all countries with which the United States has reciprocal copyright relations. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), or stored in any retrieval system in any way (electronic or mechanical) without written permission of the publisher.

The English language stock and amateur stage performance rights in the United States, its territories, possessions and Canada for EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF are controlled exclusively by Dramatists Play Service, 440 Park Avenue South, New York, NY 10016. No professional or nonprofessional performance of the Play may be given without obtaining in advance the written permission of Dramatists Play Service and paying the requisite fee.

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Inquiries concerning all other rights should be addressed to HCKR Agency, 214 West 29th Street, Suite 1203, New York, NY 10001. Attn: Mary Harden.

NOTE ON BILLING Anyone receiving permission to produce EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF is required to give credit to the Author as sole and exclusive Author of the Play on the title page of all programs distributed in connection with performances of the Play and in all instances in which the title of the Play appears, including printed or digital materials for advertising, publicizing or otherwise exploiting the Play and/or a production thereof. Please see your production license for font size and typeface requirements.

Be advised that there may be additional credits required in all programs and promotional material. Such language will be listed under the “Additional Billing” section of production licenses. It is the licensee’s responsibility to ensure any and all required billing is included in the requisite places, per the terms of the license.

SPECIAL NOTE ON SONGS/RECORDINGS Dramatists Play Service neither holds the rights to nor grants permission to use any songs or recordings mentioned in the Play. Permission for performances of copyrighted songs, arrangements or recordings mentioned in this Play is not included in our license agreement. The permission of the copyright owner(s) must be obtained for any such use. For any songs and/or recordings mentioned in the Play, other songs, arrangements, or recordings may be substituted provided permission from the copyright owner(s) of such songs, arrangements or recordings is obtained; or songs, arrangements or recordings in the public domain may be substituted. 2 For Amanda and Mom and Dad EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF was produced by Elevator Repair Service (John Collins, Artistic Director; Ariana Smart Truman, Producer) at Abrons Center in New York City in June 2018. It was directed by John Collins, the scenic design was by Louisa Thompson, the costume design was by Kaye Voyce, the lighting design was by Ryan Seelig, the sound design was by Ben Williams, the special properties design was by Amanda Villalobos, and the stage manager was Maurina Lioce. The cast was as follows:

GEORGE WASHINGTON ...... Vin Knight MARTHA WASHINGTON ...... Annie McNamara NICK SLOANE ...... Mike Iveson HONEY SLOANE ...... April Matthis CARMILLA, PhD CANDIDATE* ...... Lindsay Hockaday

* In the program for the original production, the Vampire was billed as “CARMILLA, PhD CANDIDATE” to avoid spoiling the Vampire’s appearance. The author strongly suggests using the same trick in future programs.

4 CHARACTERS

GEORGE WASHINGTON An English professor, specializing in the work of Tennessee Williams. Martha’s husband. MARTHA WASHINGTON A woman with ambition. George’s wife. NICK SLOANE A professor and slash writer. Honey’s husband. HONEY SLOANE A woman with no ambition (currently). Nick’s wife. THE VAMPIRE A feminist vampire and grad student.

SETTING

Acts One and Two: George and Martha’s living room and kitchen. Three: The road to hell.

5 EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF

ACT ONE

Scene 1

Martha and George’s living room. The front door opens. George is standing in the doorway, staring at the living room. It’s a mess.

GEORGE. What a dump. Martha pushes George aside and enters through the front door singing. She immediately starts straightening up the messy living room, mostly shoving things under couch cushions, into drawers, etc. MARTHA. (Singing.) Everyone’s fine with Virginia Woolf. Virginia Woolf. Virginia Woolf. Everyone’s fine with Virginia Woolf. La la la de da. GEORGE. Martha… MARTHA. (Still singing.) I’m totes cool with Virginia Woolf. She’s my bitch. I love her. I like how she was super gay. La la la de da. GEORGE. Make me a drink, Martha. MARTHA. (Still fussing around the room.) Look, some people are coming over, because I invited them, because they seem and we

7 never have any fun anymore. I just want to be those kinds of people for just one night, okay? Those people who go to a party but then the party keeps going. They can’t stop the party ever. Until someone says something stupid and someone’s feelings get hurt and then you go to bed crying uncontrollably and asking your god for literally any kind of assistance she can muster, but, listen to me, that bitch is busy. That. Bitch. Is. BUSY. GEORGE. I’ll make my own drink. George closes the front door behind him, goes to the bar, makes himself a drink. MARTHA. This couple that I just met at Daddy’s party—I think there’s a chance for a swap, okay, so don’t fuck this up for me. I’ll take either one of them. I don’t care. Just, please please leave the option open. Don’t say anything stupid, like, “My wife and I are totally monogamous and would never think of doing some kind of either heterosexual or homosexual swap with another couple that we met at a party.” Please, for the love of Athena, do not say anything like that, okay, George? GEORGE. (Talking to his drink.) Why am I being chastised? MARTHA. Don’t start with that. Don’t start with “beaten down man who secretly has the upper hand.” I told these people all of our secrets at the party to get them out of the way, so now we can just have a nice time and pretend that we’re young and don’t just secretly want to go to bed. GEORGE. What did you tell them? MARTHA. You’re totally gay and I’m a little gay. We have an imaginary son and an imaginary dog and I loved the dog more and you killed the son. And your parents. You have your job because of my father and you hate it and I’ve never had a job. Because of my father. And I love it. GEORGE. Did you tell them about the plants? MARTHA. Which part? GEORGE. (Suddenly furious.) How you couldn’t keep a goddam fucking plant alive if your life fucking depended on it? Even though you have nothing else to do ALL DAY besides not KILL PLANTS.

8 MARTHA. I didn’t tell them that. So for fuck’s sake, don’t bring up the plants!!! Goddammit I knew something was going to go wrong tonight. The doorbell rings. That’s them!(Sings.) I’m super in-to my own bo-dy. My own bo-dy. My own bo-dy. She opens the door. Nick and Honey are standing there. (Still singing.) I’m super in-to my own bo-dy. And soon you will be too. NICK. This is where the afterparty is, I presume? Mr. and Mrs. Sloane, at your service. HONEY. I’m not pregnant. I just found out. MARTHA. I kill plants. (To herself.) Fuuuuuuuck. (To them.) Not on purpose. I’ve never been pregnant. Not even with an idea. Please come in. They come in. Martha takes their coats. NICK. (Jovial.) I was pregnant once, but only in fiction. I used to write , and then I moved on to , which is fan fiction where you make everyone gay even if they’re not.(To Martha.) I believe I mentioned this earlier at the party? MARTHA. Oh yes. FASCINATING. NICK. (To George, excited to share more.) Well! Then there’s this thing called mpreg where you write about preexisting fictional male characters having sex with each other and then getting pregnant. For example, a werewolf and a vampire from a popular vampire- centric franchise; maybe their names are Jacob and Emmett? I don’t know, it’s just an example. But I was spending a lot of time writing stories for the slash fiction community messageboard, and it was also this thing called Mary Sue where one of the characters is a thinly veiled version of yourself, and you’re really just writing it for your own pleasure, as your own secret kind of that maybe you should have kept to yourself. And this is really looked down on in the community because it’s not seen as generous. And the slash fan fiction community is really into generosity for some reason. Like

9 you’re all sharing this secret sexuality of fictional gayness. Nick looks back to see that Honey is seated on the couch and is waiting for him to join her there. He turns back to George to quickly finish: So the point is that I was writing slash mpreg, but the pregnant was a Mary Sue version of me, so it was like I was pregnant. HONEY. Great story, hon. GEORGE. (Moving to the bar.) Drink? HONEY. Dear god yes. NICK. (Joining Honey on the couch.) I gave myself terrible morning sickness. I wanted to really write an authentic experience. Martha presses a button on the record player and some jazzy music plays. She goes to the chair next to the couch and sits suggestively, facing Nick. MARTHA. (To Nick.) I am loving how you just dove right into some really gendered stuff here.(To George.) I TOLD YOU this was going to be great. NICK. I’m not gonna lie, I did have a feeling you would enjoy hearing about that. It’s not always my automatic go-to. I like to tailor to my . But there was something about you… MARTHA. (Charmed.) Yes…? NICK. I just knew. I knew you would like it. HONEY. Well. All fiction is fan fiction. Who said that? “All fiction is fan fiction.” Wonderful! George brings Honey a drink, then sits in the chair opposite Martha. GEORGE. That is good. MARTHA. (To Nick.) Did you ever get to the birth? NICK. In the mpreg plotline of my slash fiction? MARTHA. Yes. Did you write the birth? Or just the pregnancy? NICK. I didn’t write the birth. Pause. But I imagined it.

10 MARTHA. Was it very erotic? NICK. It actually was. MARTHA. Isn’t it terrible that it isn’t in real life? Why should getting pregnant be erotic but not birth? Birth can kill you. Kill you, kill the baby. HONEY. There is such a thing as orgasmic birth. GEORGE. Please. Can we please change the subject? HONEY. I saw it on a website. Anyway, this is all my fault for blurting out that I wasn’t pregnant when we first got here. That was rude. I can’t help but say pretty much whatever I’m thinking most of the time. It’s what he loves about me. She takes Nick’s hand and they look at each other lovingly for a moment. But it’s no excuse. MARTHA. I told you about the plants. Look, I’ll tell you anything. I cried all day yesterday even though my life is arguably amazing. I keep having psychics tell me that I have to stop thinking that I’m a horrible person but the joke’s on them because I AM a horrible person. GEORGE. (Warning voice.) Martha… MARTHA. But I just think… She slides onto the couch next to Nick. I just think if I can say the things out loud, the terrible things, that they no longer have power over me. Then I am free of them because they are no longer secret. GEORGE. (Too loudly.) Who needs a drink? HONEY. (She has finished hers.) Me! George goes to the bar to make more drinks. NICK. (To Martha.) I totally get it. MARTHA. You do? NICK. I think it’s noble. MARTHA. That’s…well. That seems like an exaggeration. HONEY. He’s going to say literally anything that he thinks you want to hear. Just to warn you.

11 EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF by Kate Scelsa

2 men, 3 women

A sharp-witted of a celebrated American drama, EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF is, in turns, loving homage and fierce feminist takedown. Kate Scelsa’s incisive and hilarious reinvention of Edward Albee’s classic Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? slyly subverts the power dynamics of the original play’s not-so-happy couple. In the end, no one will be left unscathed by the ferocity of Martha’s revenge on an unsuspecting patriarchy.

“…Scelsa has a take-no-prisoners approach to that sends deconstructionist theories of feminist and gender studies way up into the ether, where they flare and fizzle like fireworks. …[EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF] bubbles with a love of theater at its most brazenly theatrical…” —The New York Times

“…Scelsa’s witty, trenchant parody of Albee’s play packs a thesis-worth of critique on the way men perceive and portray skewed images of women through the distorted lens of the American patriarchy.” —TheaterMania.com

“[A] breezily intertextual, polysexual, queer-feminist dance remix…” —Observer.com

“Kate Scelsa’s new riff on Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? tears up [the] template and sticks the pieces back together like a Dadaist poem.” —Financial Times

“…a wild and wonderful romp that will make your head spin (as well as your belly ache from laughing).” —TheaterPizzazz.com

“Who run the world? Beyoncé and playwright Kate Scelsa both agree that is, indeed, ‘Girls.’ Actually, in the case of her new play, EVERYONE’S FINE WITH VIRGINIA WOOLF, [Scelsa] argues that it’s women who run the world—powerful women who have been demonized for defying societal expectations. She couldn’t be more right.” —ManhattanDigest.com

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